Work Updates

Things at work have gone fairly well. Well as well as things can go I guess. It's still the fall season and things are absolutely busy but it's still bearable. I'm used to doing 10 hour shifts a day and fully expect them. To leave after only 8 hours is unexpected, especially since I'm now being trained to finish up at the end of the night, i.e., stay behind and make sure everyone else gets back safely before I leave.

The joys of dispatch. At least I'm getting overtime. Also, it's dead. So I often do other things while I'm waiting for the last truck to come back.

Shhh... Don't tell my bosses....

The rest of the days are still eventful though. For some reason, no one can get my name right. I'm going to blame terrible phones on either end, maybe bad reception. Most phone calls sound something like this:

Me: Damian here.
Client: Hi Dennis, I need you to...

Or:

Me: Hi, Damian speaking.
Client: David, if you could...

Or even better:

Me: Hello, this is Damian.
Client: Janice, for my order on...

Janice.

How did you get Janice.

How.

But they don't intentionally get my name wrong. It's always funny to have them call back later requesting to speak to "Dennis" only to be corrected by my coworkers that no one by that name works here. It's gotten to the point where if a client asks for a fictitious individual, the client probably wants me.

And most clients are fairly civil. Though we still get the odd individual who is unable to control himself. For example, a few weeks back, this guy who has an order. At one point he, or someone on his site calls to delay the order. No problem. Later, we also call to let him know that his concrete is going to be late, probably going to arrive at X time, because traffic is exceptionally bad. Also rush hour. We like to give clients a bit of a heads-up when we're late.

Half an hour before our estimated arrival time, I get an angry phone call that I can't transcribe because of the language used AND because I had no idea what the guy was saying half the time. I blame his bad phone, him being angry, and his heavy accent. One part of his rant sticks out to me because for a good 10 minutes he was complaining about how last winter he somehow got a cement truck out of a snow bank with a bobcat. At least, that's what I think he was saying.

What I do know is that he kept me on the phone for half an hour until the trucks arrived and then he turned his rage towards the drivers.

He didn't seem to understand that:
a) Someone on his end had delayed the order.
b) Delaying the order made it so that trucks would be right in the middle of rush hour traffic.
c) That rush hour traffic makes things slow.

3 variables that lead to delayed arrivals. Apparently the guys he had working for him also screwed up because the following week we received pictures of the finished job and it looked like someone didn't know what they were doing.

Somehow, this was our fault because we were late. Or for some other arbitrary reason. We really don't know. The sales associate for this client also had trouble understanding him through the bad phone, angry talking, and heavy accent. This continued for about 2 weeks until we cut communications. Also because he had started making threats towards us.

Yelling "HOW OLD ARE YOU?" to one of our senior sales associates is very mature.

In more positive news, my probationary period is coming to end. Which is great. I haven't been fired yet, my coworkers seem to like me. Also, with the end of my probation it means a raise.

More money. I can get behind that.

I just need to get through the end of the month without screwing up horribly or causing any disasters. I make still make mistakes, it's expected, and luckily they're small. But they're still mistakes, and I can't afford to look careless. I just need to get by without making anymore, be super-thorough and I'll be safe.

Also raise.